The vocabulary is separated into nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs for the purpose of simplicity.

Click on the English word to see information and examples of that word in use (you probably won’t be able to understand the grammar within the sentences at this point, but it is good to see as you progress through your learning).

A PDF file neatly presenting all of these words, example sentences and extra information can be found here.

Notes: 교사 refers more to the position of a teacher. You would usually refer to a teacher by calling him/her “선생님.” However, if you wanted to tell somebody what your position was, you could use 교사 (선생님 would also work here as well)

Notes: In English, the words “looking for/searching” and “find” have a similar meaning but are used differently. We use “find” after something is found. However, before something is found we use “look for/search.” In Korean, the 찾다 is used for both of these usages. This confusion often leads Korean people to incorrectly say things like “I am finding my brother.”

Notes:
The noun form of 일하다 (일) literally means “work” (as in, something you need to do). However, it is often used to refer to a task or anything that needs to be done. For example:

저는 내일 할 일이 있어요 = I have something I need to do tomorrow

Examples:
저는 그 회사에서 일해요 = I work at/for that company
저는 지난 월요일에 일했어요 = I worked last Monday
저는 2주 동안 열심히 일했어요 = I worked hard for 2 weeks
저는 그 회사에서 5월까지 일할거예요 = I will work at that company until May
저는 회사를 위해 열심히 일할거예요 = I will work hard for the company
아버지는 지금 일하고 있어요 = Dad is working now
그 사람은 10년 동안 열심히 일하고 부자가 되었어요 = That person worked hard for 10 years and then became a rich person

Notes: ~아/어버리다 is added to some verbs to express the emotion that something was done and “thrown away” at the same time. It is commonly attached to 잊다 to express that something was “forgotten and thrown away.”

In English “to miss” is a verb. 그립다 is an adjective in Korean that describes the feeling that is felt when one misses something. It is more commonly used when one misses a non-person. As an adjective, it must get treated as one. Therefore, in order to say that one misses something, it is commonly used in the Subject – Object – Adjective form that is taught in Lesson 15.

Examples:
수학은 너무 어려워요 = Math is too difficult한국에서 대학교는 고등학교보다 덜 어려워요 = In Korea, University is not as hard as high school
저는 어려운 내용을 천천히 설명했어요 = I explained the difficult content slowly
부장님을 만족시키는 것은 어려워요 = Is it is difficult to satisfy our boss
고등학교는 한국에서 어려워요 = High school is difficult in Korea

Example:
저는 같은 바지가 있어요 = I have the same pants
캐나다 사람들은 한국 사람들과 같아요 = Canadian people are the same as Korean people
이 학교는 우리 학교와 같아요 = This school and our school are the same저 식당은 이 식당과 같아요 = That restaurant is the same as this one
우리 아빠는 저것을 싫어할 것 같아요 = Dad will probably not like that
선생님이 그 수업을 하지 않을 것 같아요 = The teacher probably won’t (teach) that lesson

Notes: 일찍 is an adverb. The opposite of “early” is typically 늦다 which is an adjective. 늦게 can be used as the adverb to have the meaning of “late.” For example:
우리는 일찍 도착했어요 = We arrived early
우리는 늦게 도착했어요 = We arrived late (it would be awkward to say “lately” in English)

Examples:
우리는 내일 일찍 일어나야 돼요 = We need to wake up early tomorrow morning
왜 이렇게 일찍 가요? = Why are you going so early (like this)?
제가 일찍 가도 돼요? = May I go early?
저는 아침에 일찍 일어났어요 = I woke up early in the morning
그는 직장에서 일찍 퇴근했어요 = He left work early밖에 일찍 나가려고 숙제를 빨리 했어요 = I did my homework fast in order to go out early

As with all languages, there are some irregular conjugations that you need to know. Irregulars are applied to certain verbs or adjectives when adding something to the stem of the word. Korean grammar is based on these “additions” that are added to stems. I mentioned this in Lesson 5, but I want to reiterate it here.

There are hundreds of additions that you can add to the stem of a verb or adjective. Some of these additions are conjugations and some of them are grammatical principles that have meaning in a sentence.

You have learned about some of these additions now. For example:

~ㄴ/는다 to conjugate to the plain form

~아/어 to conjugate to the informal low respect form

~아/어요 to conjugate to the informal high respect form

~ㅂ/습니다 to conjugate to the formal high respect form

~았/었어 to conjugate to the informal low respect form in the past tense

~ㄴ/은 added to an adjective to describe an upcoming noun

In future lessons, you will learn about many more of these additions. For example, some of them are:

~ㄴ/은 후에 to mean “after”

~기 전에 to mean “before”

~기 때문에 to mean “because”

~아/어서 to mean “because”

~(으)면 to mean “when”

~아/어야 하다 to mean “one must”

~아/어서는 안 되다 to mean “one should not”

Notice that some of these additions start with a vowel, and some of them start with a consonant. Most of the irregulars are applied when adding a vowel to a stem. The ㄹ irregular that is introduced at the end of the lesson is the only irregular that applies when adding a consonant to a stem.

Let’s look at one example before I introduce each irregular one by one. Let’s say we want to conjugate the word “어렵다” into the past tense using the informal low respect form. The following would happen:

어렵다 + ~았/었어 = 어려웠어

Here, you can see that the actual stem of the word changed. This is referred to as the “ㅂ irregular” because the same phenomenon happens with many (but not all) words whose stem ends in “ㅂ”.

As I mentioned previously, most of these irregulars are applied when adding a vowel to a stem. There are many additions that start with a vowel, and you got a start on learning some of those conjugations in Lessons 5 and 6:

~아/어

~아/어요

~았/었어

~았/었어요

~았/었습니다

~았/었다

As such, this lesson will present the Korean irregulars and how they change as a result of adding these conjugations. In later lessons when you learn about other additions, you can apply what you learned in this lesson to those concepts. For now, let’s get started.

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ㅅ Irregular

If the last letter of a word stem ends in ㅅ (for example: 짓다 = to build), the ㅅ gets removed when adding a vowel. For example, when conjugating:

The third one (which is incorrect) completely changes the sound of the word stem when a vowel is added (from ‘jit’ to ‘jis.’ Whereas in the second one, the sound of the word stem only changes from ‘jit’ to ‘ji,’ which is much smaller of a difference (especially considering the ‘t’ in the pronunciation of 짓 is not aspirated – which makes it barely audible). I know that is confusing, but if you can’t understand why it is done, that’s fine. Just know that it must be done.

Some other examples of words that follow this irregular are (these words are too difficult for you right now, but I’m just showing you):

낫다 = better (adjective) – You will learn more about this word in Lesson 19잇다 = to continue (verb)

Here is a table with the word “짓다 (to build)” being conjugated using all the honorific forms you have learned so far. The irregular conjugations are in bold. Notice that this only occurs when ~아/어 (or one of its derivatives like ~았/었어요) is added to the verb stem.

짓다 = build

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

지었어

지어

짓겠어

Informal high

지었어요

지어요

짓겠어요

Plain form

지었다

짓는다

짓겠다

Formal high

지었습니다

짓습니다

짓겠습니다

Note that when a word stem has ㅅ as the fourth consonant, this irregular does not apply. For example, this does not apply to 없다, which you will learn about in the next lesson.

ㄷ irregular

If the last letter of a word stem ends in ㄷ (for example: 걷다 = to walk), the ㄷ gets changed to ㄹ when adding a vowel. This is only done with verbs. For example:

걷다 means “to walk.” When conjugating, by adding a vowel it changes to 걸어
Another meaning of 걷다 is “to tuck.” But this meaning of 걷다 does not follow the irregular rule. So, when conjugating, by adding a vowel is simply stays as 걷어.
걸다 means “to hang.” When conjugating, by adding a vowel it stays as 걸어

Confusing enough? Let’s look at all three:

걷다
To walk

걷다
To tuck

걸다
To hang

Past Formal

걸었어요

걷었어요

걸었어요

Present Formal

걸어요

걷어요

걸어요

Future Formal

걷겠어요

걷겠어요

걸겠어요

Honestly, though, the whole 걷다/걷다/걸다 thing is probably the most confusing part of this conjugation, and don’t worry too much about it. “Walk” is a word that is used much more frequently than “tuck,” so it is not something that comes up a lot.

The reason this conjugation is done is simply because the sounds flows off your tongue better. It is similar to pronouncing the word “butter” in English. When pronouncing “butter” we don’t say “butt-tter,” we just say “bud-er.” Like the ㄷ irregular, it is simply to avoid saying a hard consonant.

This is done to most stems ending in ㄷ, common words that this does not apply to (like 걷다 = to tuck) are:

Here is a table with the word “걷다 (to walk)” being conjugated using all the honorific forms you have learned so far. The irregular conjugations are in bold. Notice that this only occurs when ~아/어 (or one of its derivatives like ~았/었어요) is added to the verb stem.

걷다 = walk

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

걸었어

걸어

걷겠어

Informal high

걸었어요

걸어요

걷겠어요

Plain form

걸었다

걷는다

걷겠다

Formal high

걸었습니다

걷습니다

걷겠습니다

ㅂ Irregular

If the last letter of a word stem ends in ㅂ (쉽다 = easy), the ㅂ changes to 우 when adding a vowel. 우 then gets added to the next syllable in the conjugated word.

This is mostly done with adjectives. Many verbs end with ㅂ but this rule is rarely applied to verbs (some of the few verbs where this rule applies are: 줍다 (to pick up), 눕다 (to lie down)). For example:

Note: The ㅂ in 돕다 and 곱다 changes to 오 only when ~아/어 (or any derivative like ~았/었다 or ~아/어요) is added. When adding any other vowel, ㅂ changes to 우. As of now, you haven’t learned when you would need to add a different vowel. For example, in future lessons you will learn about adding ~ㄹ/을 to verbs. When this gets added to 돕다, it changes to 도울. This isn’t immediately pressing to you now, but you should make a mental note of it.

Because the ㅂ irregular is found in adjectives, you will be conjugating it not only at the end of a sentence, but also in the middle of a sentence (before a noun). Remember the difference between these two sentences.

In the first sentence, ‘big’ is an adjective that describes the noun (apple) at the end of the sentence.
In the second, ‘big’ describes the apple (as ‘a big apple’) and then “like” acts on the noun. In Lesson 4, you learned how to describe a noun by placing an adjective with ~ㄴ/은 before it. Adding ~ㄴ/은 to adjectives where the stem ends in “ㅂ” causes this irregular to come into play.

When placing an adjective (who’s stem ends in “ㅂ”) before a noun to describe it, you add ~ㄴ to the newly formed 우/오 syllable:

Note that in most irregulars, the word changes differently if the last vowel in the stem is ㅗ OR ㅏ. However, in the ㅂ irregular, except for 돕다 and 곱다, all applicable words are changed by adding 우. Therefore, even in words where the last vowel in the stem is ㅏ (ex: 아름답다) or ㅗ (ex: 새롭다), 우 is added. For example:

새롭다 = new
새롭 + 어요 = 새로 + 우 + 어요 = 새로워요그 학교는 새로워요 = That school is new그것은 새로운 학교예요 = That (thing) is a new school

Probably the most confusing of all irregulars, mainly because it seems strange that ㅂ can change to 우/오. The reason this happens is similar to the ㅅ irregular. As you know already, when pronouncing a syllable with the last letter ㅂ, you don’t really pronounce the ‘B’ sound. If you don’t know what I mean, check out the Pronunciation guide. But, if you add a vowel after ㅂ the sound of ‘B’ would be pronounced. The purpose of the irregular is to eliminate the ‘B’ sound which isn’t actually in the word. Confusing? Yes, I know, but again, you don’t really need to care about why it is done.

This is done to some words ending in ㅂ. Some common words in which this does not apply:

Here is a table with the word “춥다 (cold)” being conjugated using all the honorific forms you have learned so far. The irregular conjugations are in bold. Notice that this only occurs when ~아/어 (or one of its derivatives like ~았/었어요) is added to the verb stem.

춥다 = cold

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

추웠어

추워

춥겠어

Informal high

추웠어요

추워요

춥겠어요

Plain form

추웠다

춥다

춥겠다

Formal high

추웠습니다

춥습니다

춥겠습니다

Adjective form

추운 날씨 = cold weather

ㅡ Irregular

If the final vowel in a stem is ㅡ (for example: 잠그다 = to lock), when adding ~아/어, you can not determine whether you need to add ~어 or ~아 to the stem by looking at ㅡ. Instead, you must look at the vowel in the second last syllable. For example, in the word “잠그다”, the second last syllable in the stem is “잠”, and the vowel here is ㅏ. Therefore, as usual, we add ~아 to 잠그. For example:

잠그다 + ~아/어
= 잠그아

In cases like this where a word ends in “ㅡ” (that is, there is no final consonant after “ㅡ”) and is followed by ~아/어 (or any of its derivatives), the ~아/어~ the “ㅡ” is eliminated and the addition of ~아/어~ merges to the stem. For example:

잠그다 = to lock
The last vowel in the stem is ㅡ. The vowel in the second last syllable is ㅏ, so we add ~아.
For example: 잠그 + 아
Because there is no final consonant after “ㅡ”, ~아 replaces ㅡ.
잠그 + 아 = 잠가

바쁘다 = to be busy
The last vowel in stem is ㅡ. The vowel in the second last syllable is ㅏ, so we add 아.
For example: 바쁘 + 아
Because there is no final consonant after “ㅡ”, ~아 replaces ㅡ.
바쁘 + 아요 = 바빠요저는 바빠요 = I am busy

Let’s look at another example:

예쁘다 = prettyThe last vowel in the stem is ㅡ. The vowel in the second last syllable is not ㅏ or ㅗ, so we add 어.
For example: 예쁘 + 어
Because there is no final consonant after “ㅡ”, ~어 replaces ㅡ.
예쁘 + 어요 = 예뻐그 여자는 예뻐요 = That girl is pretty

Some stems only have one syllable. For example, the stem of 크다 is just 크. In this case, we know that we need to use the ㅡ irregular, but there is no previous syllable to draw on to determine what should be added to the stem. In these cases, ~어 is added to the stem. For example:

크다 = to be bigThe last vowel in the stem is ㅡ. 크 is the only syllable in the stem, so we add 어
For example: 크 + 어
Because there is no final consonant after “ㅡ”, ~어 replaces ㅡ
크 + 어요 = 커요그 집은 커요 = That house is big

This same rule applies when adding ~아/어 to words where, not only is the last vowel in the stem ㅡ, but all the vowels in the stem are ㅡ. For example, in the word “슬프다,” not only does the stem end in “ㅡ” but the vowel in the second last syllable is also “ㅡ”. In this case as well, ~어 should merge to the stem. For example:

슬프다 = to be sadThe last vowel in the stem is ㅡ. The second last vowel in the stem is also ㅡ, so we add 어
For example: 슬프 + 어
Because there is no final consonant after “ㅡ”, ~어 replaces ㅡ
슬프 + 어요 = 슬퍼요저는 아주 슬퍼요 = I am very sad

Sometimes the last vowel of a stem is ㅡ, but the stem ends in a consonant. In these cases, all of the above rules still apply, but the addition of ~아/어 does not merge to the stem (because it is blocked by the consonant). For example:

긁다 = to scratch
The last vowel in the stem is ㅡ. 긁 is the only syllable in the stem, so we add 어
For example: 긁 + 어
Because there is a final consonant after “ㅡ”, ~어 does not merge to the stem
긁 + 어요 = 긁어요저는 머리를 긁었어요 = I scratched my head

Another example where we find a single-syllable word with “ㅡ” as the only vowel is “듣다 (to hear)”

듣다 = to hear
Last vowel in stem is ㅡ. There is no syllable preceding 듣, so we must add 어.
듣 ends in a consonant, so 어 does not get added directly to the syllable.
듣 + 었어요 = 듣었어요

But wait! Don’t forget the ㄷ irregular. In this example, both ㅡ and ㄷ irregulars are used:

An irregular to this already irregular rule is “만들다 (to make).” Even though the second last syllable in the stem has the vowel “ㅏ”, ~어~ is added instead of ~아~. For example:

만들다 + ~아/어요
= 만들어요

Here is a table with the word “잠그다 (to lock – which is a verb)” being conjugated using all the honorific forms you have learned so far. The irregular conjugations are in bold. Notice that this only occurs when ~아/어 (or one of its derivatives like ~았/었어요) is added to the verb stem.

잠그다 = lock

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

잠갔어

잠가

잠그겠어

Informal high

잠갔어요

잠가요

잠그겠어요

Plain form

잠갔다

잠근다

잠그겠다

Formal high

잠갔습니다

잠급니다

잠그겠습니다

And here is a table with the word “예쁘다 (pretty – which is an adjective)” being conjugated using all the honorific forms you have learned so far. The irregular conjugations are in bold. Notice that this only occurs when ~아/어 (or one of its derivatives like ~았/었어요) is added to the verb stem.

예쁘다 = pretty

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

예뻤어

예뻐

예쁘겠어

Informal high

예뻤어요

예뻐요

예쁘겠어요

Plain form

예뻤다

예쁘다

예쁘겠다

Formal high

예뻤습니다

예쁩니다

예쁘겠습니다

Finally, here is a table with the word “만들다 (to make – which is a verb)” being conjugated using all the honorific forms you have learned so far.

만들다 = to make

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

만들었어

만들어

만들겠어

Informal high

만들었어요

만들어요

만들겠어요

Plain form

만들었다

만든다

만들겠다

Formal high

만들었습니다

만듭니다

만들겠습니다

You will learn how 만든다 and 만듭니다 are formed later in the lesson when you learn about the ㄹ irregular.

르 Irregular

If the final syllable in a stem is 르 (마르다), it is conjugated differently when adding ~아/어. This irregular only applies when adding ~아/어(or any of its derivatives) to a stem and not when adding any other grammatical principles that starts with a vowel or consonant. Up until now, you haven’t learned about any of these other grammatical principles, that can start with anything other than ~아/어~, so don’t worry about this distinction too much.

When adding ~아/어 to these words, an additional ㄹ is created and placed in the syllable preceding 르 as the last consonant. The 르 also gets changed to either 러 or 라 (depending on if you are adding 어 or 아). This is done to both verbs and adjectives (the only exception is 따르다 = to follow/to pour). This is difficult to explain, and much easier to show with examples:

Here is a table with the word “고르다 (to choose – which is a verb)” being conjugated using all the honorific forms you have learned so far. The irregular conjugations are in bold. Notice that this only occurs when ~아/어 (or one of its derivatives like ~았/었어요) is added to the verb stem.

고르다 = choose

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

골랐어

골라

고르겠어

Informal high

골랐어요

골라요

고르겠어요

Plain form

골랐다

고른다

고르겠다

Formal high

골랐습니다

고릅니다

고르겠습니다

And here is a table with the word “마르다 (thin – which is an adjective)” being conjugated using all the honorific forms you have learned so far. The irregular conjugations are in bold. Notice that this only occurs when ~아/어 (or one of its derivatives like ~았/었어요) is added to the verb stem.

마르다 = thin

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

말랐어

말라

마르겠어

Informal high

말랐어요

말라요

마르겠어요

Plain form

말랐다

마르다

마르겠다

Formal high

말랐습니다

마릅니다

마르겠습니다

Adjective form

마른 여자 = thin girl

ㄹ Irregular

Okay, last one, I promise.

As you know, there are times when you must choose between two things to add to a stem. For example:

~아/어 means you must choose between adding ~아 or ~어
~ㄴ/은 means you must choose between adding ~ㄴ or ~은
~ㅂ/습 means you must choose between adding ~ㅂ or ~습
~ㄹ/을 means you must choose between adding ~ㄹ or ~을

As you know, you choose the correct addition based on the stem.

If the final letter of a stem is ㄹ AND you add any of the following:

~ㄴ/은
~ㄴ/는
~ㅂ/습
~ㄹ/을

The first option (~ㄴ/ ~ㅂ / ~ㄹ ) should be used. In addition, the ㄹ is removed from the stem and the ~ㄴ / ~ㅂ / ~ㄹ is add directly to the stem. Let’s look at each one individually.

ㄹ Irregular: Adding ~ㄴ/은 to words

You have learned about adding ~ㄴ/은 to adjective stems when describing nouns. Usually, you add ~ㄴ directly to the stem of an adjective ending in a vowel, and ~은 to the stem of an adjective ending in a consonant, for example:

크다 = 큰 남자
작다 = 작은 남자

When adding ~ㄴ/은 to a stem which ends in ㄹ, the ㄹ is removed and ㄴ is added to the stem:

There will be times when you have to add ~ㄴ/은 to verbs stems as well, but you haven’t learned about this yet. I introduce this concept in Lesson 26, and then talk about the irregular being applied in Lesson 28. I don’t want you to think about this too much until those lessons, but just so you know, the concept is the same as adding ~ㄴ/은 to an adjective. For example:

열다 = to open
열 + ㄴ = 연

Although you haven’t learned about adding ~ㄴ/은 to stems, you have learned about adding ~ㄴ/는다 to verb stems. Normally, you add ~ㄴ다 to the stem of a verb ending in a vowel, and ~는다 to the stem of a verb ending in a consonant. For example:

나는 집에 간다 = I go home
나는 밥을 먹는다 = I eat rice

But when adding ~ㄴ/는다 to a verb stem that ends in ㄹ, you must remove ㄹ and add ~ㄴ다 to the verb stem:

You have also learned about adding ~ㅂ/습니다 to verb and adjective stems when conjugating in the Formal high respect form: Normally, you add ~ㅂ니다 to the stem of a word ending in a vowel, and ~습니다 to the stem of a word ending in a consonant. For example:

머리 can mean ‘head’ or ‘hair’ depending on the context. If you want to specifically mention your hair, you can say “머리카락” always means the hair on one’s head. 머리 or 머리카락 does not refer to the hair on an animal, or the body hair of a human. This hair is referred to as “털” and extends to most of the hair that can be found on animals (fur, the wool on a sheep, etc)

The addition of ~ㅂ/습니다 only affects words that end in ㄹ. There is no irregular that occurs if adding ~ㅂ/습니다 to any other type of stem. For example, notice how only the stem of 길다 changes as a result of adding this:

Irregular

Example Word

+ ~ㅂ/습니다

ㅅ Irregular

짓다

짓습니다

ㄷ Irregular

걷다

걷습니다

ㅂ Irregular

쉽다

쉽습니다

ㅡ Irregular

예쁘다

예쁩니다

르 Irregular

마르다

마릅니다

ㄹ Irregular

길다

깁니다

Here is a table with the word “열다 (to open – which is a verb)” being conjugated using all the honorific forms you have learned so far. The irregular conjugations are in bold. Notice that this only occurs when ~ㄴ or ~ㅂ is added to the verb stem.

열다 = open

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

열었어

열어

열겠어

Informal high

열었어요

열어요

열겠어요

Plain form

열었다

연다

열겠다

Formal high

열었습니다

엽니다

열겠습니다

And here is a table with the word “길다 (long – which is an adjective)” being conjugated using all the honorific forms you have learned so far. Notice that this only occurs when ~ㄴ or ~ㅂ is added to the verb stem (it would happen when ~ㄴ is added, but you don’t add ~ㄴ/는 to an adjective when you conjugate it like this. There are times, however, when this would happen, but you haven’t even gotten close to learning about them yet. For example, in Lesson 76, we talk about the addition of ~ㄴ/는데 to clauses. This would make 길다 turn into 긴데. Please don’t even think about looking ahead until Lesson 76 until you’ve finished with this lesson, and the 69 lessons in between.

길다 = long

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

길었어

길어

길겠어

Informal high

길었어요

길어요

길겠어요

Plain form

길었다

길다

길겠다

Formal high

길었습니다

깁니다

길겠습니다

Adjective form

긴 거리 = long road

I don’t want to confuse you too much more because I am sure you are already really confused. Just the amount of content on this page alone is enough to make somebody cry. That being said, I think it is a very good exercise to try to compare how the words 듣다 and 들다 differ in their conjugations. Don’t worry about the meaning of 들다 yet (it is a very complex word that has many meanings), but just assume it is a verb in this case. For now, let’s just focus on how they are conjugated.

Notice that when conjugating 듣다, you need to consider the following irregular patterns:

ㄷ irregular (because it ends in ㄷ)

ㅡ irregular (because the final vowel is ㅡ)

The following table shows how 듣다 should be conjugated across the honorifics and tenses you have learned so far: (Irregular conjugations are in bold)

듣다 = to hear

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

들었어

들어

듣겠어

Informal high

들었어요

들어요

듣겠어요

Plain form

들었다

듣는다

듣겠다

Formal high

들었습니다

듣습니다

듣겠습니다

Notice when conjugating 들다, you need to consider the following irregular patterns:

ㄹ irregular (because it ends in ㄹ)

ㅡ irregular (because the final vowel is ㅡ)

The following table shows how 들다 should be conjugated across the honorifics and tenses you have learned so far: (Irregular conjugations are in bold)

들다

Past

Present

Future

Informal low

들었어

들어

들겠어

Informal high

들었어요

들어요

들겠어요

Plain form

들었다

든다

들겠다

Formal high

들었습니다

듭니다

들겠습니다

I feel that comparing these two is a very good exercise because you can see that sometimes, because of the irregular conjugations, 듣다 might look exactly like 들다. For example, in all of the past tense conjugations, there is no way to distinguish between the two based on sound, and the only way to distinguish them is by context in a sentence.

There is no easy way around memorizing stuff like this. The only words of encouragement I can give you is that – as you become more and more familiar with the language, and as you expose yourself to it more and more, it does become second nature. I know you can’t believe that now, but it does.

Adding ~ㄴ/은 to Adjectives

I mentioned this in some of the sections above, but I would like to organize it all here. In Lesson 4, you learned how to add ~ㄴ/은 to adjectives to describe an upcoming noun. Some irregulars will come into play when adding doing this because of the possibility of adding a vowel to a stem. Let’s look at the word “어렵다” as an example. 어렵다 has a consonant as its final letter, which means that ~은 must be added (instead of ~ㄴ). Therefore, we end up with:

어렵은

Because of this, we now have the final consonant “ㅂ” followed by a vowel, which causes the ㅂ irregular to be applied. The correct conjugation of 어렵다 + ~ㄴ/은 is therefore “어려운.”

Below is a table that shows how irregular adjectives can change because of adding ~ㄴ/은:

Irregular

Example Word

Does this apply?

Application

ㅅ Irregular

낫다 (better)

YES

나은

ㄷ Irregular

NA

NA

NA

ㅂ Irregular

쉽다 (easy)

YES

쉬운

ㅡ Irregular

바쁘다 (busy)

NO

바쁜

르 Irregular

빠르다 (fast)

NO

빠른

ㄹ Irregular

길다 (long)

YES

긴

Looking Ahead to Grammatical Principles that you will Learn in Future Lessons

There are many additions that you will learn in future lessons. You will learn the meaning and usage of all of these when they become important for your level of study. When you learn about a new addition in a future lesson, I will explain how it causes irregular words to change.

The good thing is – if you learn how one format of addition causes irregulars to change, every addition with the same initial letters will cause the same change. For example, adding ~아/어 causes ㅅ to be eliminated in words that follow the ㅅ irregular. Likewise, any other addition that starts with ~아/어 causes the same change. For example, if I add ~아/어 or ~았/었다to 짓다, we see the same change to the word stem – that is 짓다 changes to 지어 and 지었다 respectively.

This same idea can be applied to grammatical additions that will be introduced in later lessons. For example, in Lesson 43 you will learn how ~(으)면 causes irregular words to change. The change that results from adding ~(으)면 is exactly the same as the change that results from adding similar additions like ~(으)며 and ~(으)면서. Therefore, you don’t need to memorize how each one affects irregulars, but rather how the general format of adding ~(으)ㅁ… will affect irregulars. I know the road ahead to memorizing these new additions and their effects on irregulars looks daunting, but this grouping of formats will allow your brain to compartmentalize the information.

Each time a new format/style of addition is introduced in my lessons, I will explain how irregulars adapt to it. This only needs to be done once for each format, because each successive addition with the same format will create the same change to irregulars. Below is a list of grammatical principles you will learn in future lessons. Each one follows a particular style. In each of these lessons, I will explain how they cause irregular words to change. Furthermore, I will explain the other grammatical principles that follow the same format that will create the same change:

For now, focus on the concepts that were introduced in this lesson. When you reach each of the lessons above, I will bring up the discussion of irregulars again. At that point, we can talk about how that grammatical principle causes irregular words to change.

Everybody is confused when they learn these irregulars. Eventually you will reach a point where all of these will come natural to you. Whenever you learn a new word where the stem ends in ㅅ/ㄹ/ㅂ/ㄷ/르/ㅡ just make a mental note about how you should conjugate that word in the future. I don’t even have to think about these irregulars anymore because they just flow out naturally. If you can’t memorize them all right now, just try to understand them, which will allow you to recognize them later. Eventually, you will memorize them simply from using and hearing them so much.

There are 1250 example sentences in Unit 1.
All entries are linked to an audio file. You can download all of these files in one package here.